Zanzi Eats Stone Town Food Tour with 15+ Tastings

Stone Town was built on trade, and you can taste the evidence. For centuries, wooden dhows crossed the Indian Ocean carrying spices, rice, coconuts and recipes between East Africa, Arabia, Persia and India. Our four-hour feast of 15+ tastings begins beneath the ornate balconies of the Old Dispensary, a late nineteenth-century landmark built by Zanzibar's wealthy Indian merchant community.

Before we get started, our tour reflects the local cuisine and the limitations of traditional eateries mean we unfortunately cannot cater for every dietary restriction. Here's an honest appraisal so nobody is disappointed:

✔ Suitable for halal diets and no pork diets

⚠ Pescatarian, lactose intolerance, vegetarian, mild nut allergies, and no seafood diets can be accommodated, but some tastings will be unsuitable.
✖️ Unsuitable for gluten intolerance, coeliac and vegan diets.

We begin on the street at a favourite local vendor for creamy maharagwe ya nazi sees beans slowly simmered in coconut milk, while sweet pumpkin gets the same coconut treatment in boga la nazi. We'll tear through flaky chapatis and pillowy vitumbua, lightly sweet rice cakes cooked until golden at the edges. Coconut is one of the great building blocks of Swahili coastal cooking, and you'll quickly discover just how many directions Zanzibar's cooks can take it.

Then we'll slip behind the scenes at a traditional halua workshop. Zanzibar's Omani-influenced version of halwa is sticky, dense and gloriously rich, made with sugar, ghee, warming spices and nuts. If production is underway, we'll watch enormous copper pans being worked as the mixture slowly thickens into its glossy final form.

We're on an island, so seafood was never going to stay off the menu for long. Tender calamari arrives in a rich coconut curry, ready to be scooped up with flaky chapatis. Then comes urojo, better known as Zanzibar Mix: a wonderfully chaotic bowl of tangy, spicy broth loaded with fritters and assorted toppings. It's the sort of dish that makes little sense on paper and perfect sense by the second spoonful.

We'll continue to Jaws Corner, Stone Town's unofficial living room. For decades, locals have gathered around this tiny square to drink strong coffee, discuss politics, argue over football and watch the old town go by. We'll pull up alongside them for crisp, gently sweet mandazi and a small cup of punchy Tanzanian coffee.

Zanzibar's old spice routes come roaring back with beef biryani. Rice dishes travelled across the Indian Ocean with merchants and migrants from Arabia and the Indian subcontinent, but here they encountered an island famous for cloves, cinnamon, cardamom and pepper. The result is distinctly Zanzibari: fragrant rice layered with slow-cooked beef and warm spice. Alongside come the quieter heroes of the Swahili table: silky stewed aubergine and tender bamia la nazi, okra enriched with coconut. These are homestyle dishes rather than restaurant showpieces, the sort of food cooked in family kitchens across the island.

We'll also duck behind the scenes at an old neighbourhood bakery, where bread is still baked against the fierce heat of a traditional wood-fired oven. If our timing is good, we'll tear into a loaf while it's still warm.

Our final stretch takes us through the organised chaos of Darajani Bazaar, Stone Town's great trading heart. Spice sellers, fruit stands, butchers and produce stalls crowd beneath its roof and spill onto the surrounding streets, offering a final glimpse at the ingredients that keep Zanzibar cooking. There's still room for a few last tastes. We'll spoon into warming boko boko, a comforting dish with centuries of history around the Indian Ocean, before breaking off pieces of nutty kashata, Zanzibar's crisp peanut sweet. A fragrant cup of spiced coffee brings our feast to a suitably aromatic close. Over four hours, we'll trace the merchants, migrations and spice routes that shaped the island through the street vendors, markets, bakeries and local eateries that continue feeding Zanzibar today.